Mausoleum's closing is frustrating to loved ones

For JoAnne Bergman, the idea of having to move her late husband from American Mausoleum is akin to reliving his death.

Andy Kravetz

For JoAnne Bergman, the idea of having to move her late husband from American Mausoleum is akin to reliving his death.

Bergman, who has since remarried, entombed Rudy Leos in 1986, with the idea the mausoleum would be his final resting place. On Tuesday morning, she came to the conclusion that wasn’t likely now that the facility is in bankruptcy.

She and a handful of others listened for nearly an hour as the judge and attorneys for the mausoleum and the Illinois Comptroller’s office tried to find a way to keep the facility open.

"I understand now what is going on but it’s very frustrating," she said afterward. "To think that after 22 years, I will have to move him and find a new location, that’s going to bring everything right back up again."

Karin Dalton, whose late husband Patrick was entombed there in 1995, feels the same way. During the hearing, she peppered Gary Rafool, the mausoleum’s attorney, with questions about where the money went. The answers weren’t what she wanted.

The mausoleum filed for bankruptcy last week. There’s no cash in the bank, the filing stated. The mortgage runs $9,000 a month with expenses of nearly $5,000. That doesn’t include badly needed repairs to a leaky roof which Rafool said would cost about $150,000.

As he described the condition of the now-closed mausoleum, which has standing water in some portions, one lady put her head down.

Carla Klicker, whose son, Kevin Henderson, is entombed at the mausoleum, is upset because she just found out about the situation last week. She wishes someone had told her that things weren’t going well. While it wouldn’t have helped in the long run, it could have eased the shock, she said.

"You pay all that money for your loved ones to have a nice place and they let it go," she said. "I don’t know how we are going to come up with the money to move Kevin. We are going to have to put our heads together."